With all the stellar advancements in Web technology it can be extremely easy to get carried away and soup up your site with all the latest technical bells and whistles. And if you go through a professional website programmer, then there’s a good chance they will try to talk you into more than a few types of bells and whistles. As much as additional site elements—flash graphics, talking avatars, interactive questionnaires—may be legitimate add-ons, adding viable value to your site, bootstrapped business owners shouldn’t even start to consider these add-ons until they’ve got some positive cash flow consistently coming in. Even if you have a small business loan to fall back on, that loan can quickly dissipate if you stray from your path of essential business-building tools.
Unless you’ve got a friend who specializes in Web programming and website design with whom you can strike a barter deal, you’re going to want to keep your first website as basic as possible to relives some stress on that precarious budget of yours. But you fellow bootstrappers will be delighted to know that you can build your own website in a day (if you work really hard). And you don’t even need any prior experience to build a successful site.
A site hosting company is a business that provides a server for your website and allows it to be seen live on the Web. Essentially, they plug you into the Web for approximately $10 per month (I use Host Gator). Many times, your site hosting company will also offer you free site-building software with your monthly hosting service. This type of software helps you construct your own website using a simple plug-and-go format ( I recommend wordpress and Joomla).
The software incorporates preexisting tablets and preprogrammed coding, which means that your site is essentially already built for you. All you need to do is select a few elements that will help to personalize your site, such as selecting your favorite color schemes, uploading a photo of yourself, and adding content about your business. And it’s incredibly easy to add your own copy, usually just requiring simply copy and paste procedures. Other website programs include a content management site (CMS) that allows you to write your copy directly into the site and choose your formatting options.
Most of these complimentary site-builder software programs will be accompanied by simple instructions, but you can easily search for keywords such as “how to build a website,” “easy-to-create websites,” and “website building resources” to find even more extensive information on how to do it yourself.
After you have gotten your feet wet trying it out yourself, and you are ready to add new things it is a good time to talk to some web professionals about what is out there. I am one of those people that can set you on the right path.
www.bootstrappingblog.com
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